Meet Miguel Fraga, M.A., the Republic of Cuba‘s first emmisary from the newly restored Cuban Embassy in Washington, D.C. Mr. Fraga is the new Cuban EmbassySecretary. And he is currently on a tour of the United States shedding light on Cuba, its people, its culture, it’s Marxist-LeninistRevolutionary Republic, and its challenges coming from the U.S. government, such as the painful decades-long economic embargo. Mr . Fraga also reflects upon why some 147 nations around the world have long called for an end to the USA‘s embargo against Cuba.

[Partial transcript of actual radio broadcast by Messina for Lumpenproletariat and Project Censored] [1]

PROJECT CENSORED—[11 MAR 2016] “Welcome to the Project Censored show on Pacifica Radio. I’m Peter Phillips. Joining me today, as co-host, is a Project Censored professor, Nolan Higdon. He teaches Latin American History, at the California State University-East Bay. [Co-host] Mickey Huff will return next week.

“On today’s show, we interview Miguel Fraga, the first secretary of the Cuban Embassy in Washington, D.C. We will discuss the emerging issues of re-establishing diplomatic relations between the U.S. and Cuba. Then, also, we’re gonna ask what it was like to grow up in a communist country. We hope you stay tuned. (c. 1:08)

[Theme music continues, “We Want” by Junkyard Empire]

DR. PETER PHILLIPS: “Welcome to the Project Censored show on Pacifica Radio. I’m Peter Phillips. My co-host today is Nolan Higdon, who teaches Latin American History at the California State University-East Bay. Mickey [Huff] will be back next week.

NOLAN HIGDON, M.A.: “Miguel Fraga is the first secretary of the U.S. Embassy of Cuba. For the previous four years, he’s worked in the office of the United States division of Cuban Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Havana, Cuba. Before that, he served as third secretary in the Cuban Embassy in Canada. Fraga received a Bachelor of Science and Law at the University of Havana, and a Master of Science and Foreign Relations from Higher Institute of Foreign Relations ‘Raúl Roa Garcia’, in Havana. ”

“Fraga has been speaking, this week, in the San Francisco Bay Area addressing the question: Has U.S. policy towards Cuba really changed? Welcome to the Project Censored show.” (c. 2:24)

MIGUEL FRAGA, M.S.: “Thank you very much. It is a pleasure to be here. Thank you for the opportunity.”

NOLAN HIGDON, M.A.: “We love having you. So, what can you tell us about what it was like to grow up in Cuba?” (c. 2:36)

MIGUEL FRAGA, M.S.: [Mr. Fraga discussed his early experiences growing up in Cuba as being marked by equal opportunities for all, despite a lack of resources and other hardships in Cuba.] (c. 5:31)

NOLAN HIGDON, M.A.: “True. Yeah, I think that’s an interesting point you bring up there because the narrative that we use a lot in the United States is that we stopped holding normalised relations, as it were, in the 1960s. But before then there was this, like, happy-go-lucky relationship. And Cuba and the US. got along. But I wanted to point to that because the U.S. has always been intervening in Cuban affairs, both, before and after normalised relations.

“Knowing that history, how do the Cuban people feel about this? Do they actually see this as a change? Or, another step in a long process of this, what can only be described as a difficult relationship with the United States?” (c. 6:11)

MIGUEL FRAGA, M.S.: [Mr. Fraga often gets asked this “wonderful” question. But he emphasized that Cubans “don’t hate” Americans because Cubans know there is a difference between the American people and their government.] (c. 7:32)

DR. PETER PHILLIPS: “So, you grew up in a society of general equality. And you weren’t blasted with advertisements of buying things. This is one of the things, that was most interesting to me in Cuba, the last few times. With the young people, I could kid with them and say: Don’t you want a Happy Meal? And they would know what I was talking about. But they would just laugh and laugh and laugh about how funny that was because that’s not part of the culture. You’re not blasted with this: Buy this, buy that. Do you see that making changes in that area? Or do people, once that’s in their personality, will that stay with them?” (c. 8:15)

MIGUEL FRAGA, M.S.: [Mr. Fraga explained that Cuba, being a small nation with limited resources, must have different priorities. For example, according to the World Bank, spending the highest per capita on education. Moreover, Cuba values diminishing economic differences, or what celebrated economic thinker Thorstein Veblen would call “invidious distinctions”, particularly in education and health care, which Cubans do not want to privatise. Mr. Fraga added: “And people in Cuba want more because we are young. We know all these good things you have. But we don’t want for only a few people to have that.”] (c. 9:53)